I glanced at the scar in the palm of my hand.
This was either going to be an ending
(endings were always so easy for you)
or something would get healed, and the healing would forestall a tragedy.
The writer, in his own way, vehemently disagreed.
Privileged children mumbled warnings to one another as they headed toward the fleet of SUVs waiting for them. Security cameras followed the boys. Sons would always be in peril. Fathers would always be condemned.
Robby’s backpack was flung over his shoulder and his shirt was untucked and the gray and red striped tie loosened, hanging slackly from around his neck: the parody of a tired businessman.
Robby was staring at the Porsche and at the man in the driver’s seat. Robby looked at the man questioningly, as if I were someone who had never known his name.
My questions were going to merge with his answers.
I could feel his doubt as he stood rigidly in front of the car.
I was begging him to move forward. You have to surrender, I was begging. You have to give me another chance.
The writer was about to hiss something, and I silenced him.
And then, as if he had heard me, Robby shuffled toward the car, forcing a smile.
He took his backpack off before opening the passenger door.
“What’s up?” He was grinning as he placed the backpack on the floor.
As he sat down he closed the passenger door. “Where’s Marta?”
“Okay, look,” I started, “I know you’re not happy to see me, so you don’t have to smile like that.”
Robby didn’t even pause. He immediately turned away and was about to open the door when I locked it. His hand clutched the handle.
“I want to talk to you,” I said, now that we were both encased within the car.
“About what?” He let go of the handle and stared straight ahead.
The division in the car asserted itself, as I had expected it to.
“Look, I want all the bullshit dropped, okay?”
He turned to me, incredulous. “What bullshit, Dad?”
The “Dad” was the giveaway.
“Oh, shit, Robby, stop it. I know how miserable you’ve been.” I breathed in and tried to soften my voice but failed. “Because I’ve been miserable in that house as well.” I breathed in again. “I’ve made everyone miserable in that house. You don’t have to pretend anymore.”
I watched his smooth jaw clench and then unclench as he stared out the windshield.
“I want you to tell me what’s going on.” I had turned in my seat so that I was facing him. My arms were crossed.
“About what?” he asked worriedly.
“About the missing boys.” There was no way to control the urgency of my voice. “What do you know about them?”
His silence emphasized something. Around us, kids were piling into cars. The cars were maneuvered out of the circular drive while the Porsche sat stationary against the curb. I was waiting.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said softly.
“I talked to Ashton’s mom. I talked to Nadine. Do you know what she found on his computer?”
“She’s crazy.” Robby turned to face me, panicked. “She’s crazy, Dad.”
“She said she found correspondence between the missing boys and Ashton. She said the correspondence was dated after these boys disappeared.”
Robby’s face flushed and he swallowed. In rapid succession: contempt, speculation, acceptance. So: Ashton had sold them out. So: Ashton was the traitor. Robby imagined a streaming comet. Robby imagined traveling to distant cities where—
Wrong, Bret. Robby imagined escape.
“What does this have to do with me?” he asked.
“It has a hell of a lot to do with you when Ashton’s sending you files to download and Cleary Miller is sending you a letter and—”
“Dad, that’s not—”
“And I heard you in the mall on Saturday. When you were standing with your friends and someone brought up Maer Cohen’s name. And then you all stopped talking, because you didn’t want me to hear the conversation. What in the hell was that about, Robby?” I paused and kept trying to control the volume of my voice. “Do you want to talk about this? Do you want to tell me something?”
“I don’t know what there is to talk about.” His voice was calm and rational, but the lie was turning its black head toward me.
“Stop it, Robby.”
“Why are you getting mad at me?”
“I’m not getting mad at you. I’m just worried. I’m very worried about you.”
“Why are you worried?” he asked, his eyes pleading. “I’m fine, Dad.”
There it was again. The word “Dad.” It was a seduction. I momentarily left earth.
“I want you to stop that.”
“Stop what?”
“I don’t want you to feel that you have to lie to me anymore.”
“What am I lying about?”
“Goddamnit, Robby,” I shouted. “I saw what was on your computer. I saw that page with Maer Cohen. Why in the hell are you lying?”
He whirled toward me in horror. “You went into my computer?”
“Yeah, I did. I saw the files, Robby.”
“Dad—”
He momentarily forgot his lines. He began improvising.
(Or better yet, the writer suggested, he sent in the understudy.)
Suddenly Robby started smiling. Robby slumped forward with exaggerated relief.
And then he started laughing to himself.
“Dad, I don’t know what you thought you saw—”
“It was a letter—”
“Dad—”
“It was from Cleary Miller—”
“Dad, I don’t even know Cleary Miller. Why would he send me a letter?”
I asked the writer: Are you writing his dialogue?
When the writer didn’t answer, I started hoping that Robby was being genuine.
“What’s happening with the missing boys? Do you know something we should all know? Do you or your friends know anything that would help people—”
“Dad, it’s not what you think.” He rolled his eyes. “Is this what you’re all upset about?”
“What do you mean it’s not what I think, Robby?”
Robby turned to me again and, with a grin tilting his lips, he said, “It’s just a game, Dad. It’s just a stupid game.”
It took me a long time to judge if this was the truth or the black lie returning.
“What’s a game?” I asked.
“The missing guys.” He shook his head. He seemed both relieved and slightly embarrassed. Was this an intriguing combination—one I wasn’t sure I trusted—or simply an attitude he rented?
“What do you mean—a game?”
“We kind of keep track of them.” He paused. “We have these bets.”
“What?” I asked. “You have bets on what?”
Now it was Robby’s turn to breathe in. “On who’s going to be found first.”
I said nothing.
“Sometimes we send each other e-mails pretending to be the guys and it’s really stupid, but we’re just trying to freak each other out.” He smiled to himself again. “That’s what Ashton’s mom saw . . .”
I kept staring at him.
Robby realized he had to climb onto my level.
“Dad, do you think those guys . . . are, like, dead?”
The writer emerged and pointed out that the question had no fear in it.
The question wanted a response from me that Robby could gauge. He was going to learn something about me from that response. He would then act on what he gleaned.
Things were slowing down.
“I don’t know what to believe, Robby. I don’t know if you’re telling me the truth.”
“Dad,” he said softly in an attempt to calm me down, “I’ll show you when I get home.”